The proposed research will identify and assess the extent to which various social, historical, and legal factors may differentially affect the process by which mentally ill American Indians who live in reservation communities are civilly committed for psychiatric observation and/or treatment. Recent court decisions emphasize the confusing, sometimes absent jurisdictional controls that hinder attempts by federal, state and tribal authorities to commit said persons. A wide variety of circumstances may apply among service units within the same Indian Health Service administrative area. Preliminary inquiries by the authors indicate the human costs of this situation. By describing and classifying the civil commitment procedures practices by state, federal and tribal functionaries in two reservation communities which are subject to different jurisdictional controls within each of the ten Indian Health Service administrative areas, the proposed study will be able to develop a comprehensive model both to explain local responses to individual cases and to guide future legislation of appropriate law.